FROM A SITE VISITOR: After 2 years of putting thousands of thoughts and concepts that were rising in what I then described as "My Mind" up against the question, "Is That True"? I started to become aware (none of how I am saying this is quite true, but language is by nature separating, I am seeing) that nothing was true, and what I am NOT was clear. And now even what I appear to be, and what the world appears to be is okey dokey too, i just don't believe it anymore!
Anyway, my question is this. [The visitor at this point described her involvement in a quasi-spiritual religious group and revealed what seems to be the early stirrings of a less-blocked consciousness that is beginning to question the value of attachment to the group. She is also beginning to see, it seems, that the real attachment is not as much to the group as it is to the ego-states generated by membership in the group and to all of the related “doingness” that had previously been undertaken without any independent questioning on her part about whether or not any of the teachings or activities really make any sense.] She continued:
Ego is really clinging here and I would love to hear your response to this. I googled [certain topics] and there you were! I am not a student of Advaita, but after this "experience" i describe above, I was given a book on advaita and it MATCHED totally with this awareness, now aware of itself, in this space here. So strange to try and language this. Coming from no spiritual path, I am finding language very limiting. PS: Loving your blog. "My" head just nodding, YES YES YES as I read and recognize truth. L.L.
F.: To continue with the point offered yesterday, it is the task of the teacher to read or listen to the words of a seeker and to determine “where” on the “path” the person might be. Then, pointers can be offered that might allow the seeker to shift to the next level.
The key? The “state” of the consciousness, or more specifically, the degree to which programming has blocked the consciousness from accessing itSelf and from knowing itSelf. Only if the readiness is present (that is, only if the consciousness within can begin to question beliefs and ideas and concepts that have previously gone unquestioned) can pointers initiate any shift at all.
The book FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE (A Seven-Step Journey to Realization) is a set of transcriptions of satsang sessions that were taped. One exchange touched on the subject of readiness:
F.: “Early on, my teacher guessed that one in ten thousand might make it to the ‘end’ [of the ‘path’ to Realization]; later, he predicted one in a million. He was only guessing, but he might have been close.
Questioner: “Not very good odds.”
F.: “Indeed.”
Questioner: "Maybe we need better teachers." [Laughter]
F.: "Indeed."
Questioner: “No fight? Ha.”
F.: “None. The variable is not the teacher. The readiness is all. Are you ready?”
Questioner: “Yes.”
F.: “We’ll see.”
In the case of the e-mail from the visitor cited above, it is obvious that the seeker is at the third of the seven steps to Realization. Most are placed in that level from early on as a result of religious indoctrination during childhood. Some “find religion” or “find god” or “find spirituality” later on and enter into the third level during adulthood.
Persons in the former group who were indoctrinated early on have little chance of shifting beyond the third step. Those in the latter group who have “come to” religion or spirituality later in life have a greater chance of shifting beyond that third step; however, few of those are likely to do so, either.
For those who came to religion or spirituality and/or belief in a personal god during their adult years, most merely abandoned their former personas (the “bad” ones) and simply replaced their former ego-states with new personas—religious or spiritual personas—and have been convinced that those are “good” ones.
Either way, false identities are false identities, and accepting religious and/or spiritual identifications as being real will block the finding of the True Self just as much as any other personas that are adopted.
When a seven-step “journey” fixates at the third step, then the play amounts to nothing more than “religious game-playing” or “kindergarten spirituality,” but the super religious or super spiritual think they are basking in the light of high noon when, in fact, it is only the early dawn.
In some rare cases, a person (a persona-player) might become conscious of her/his true state of discomfort and begin to question and begin to seek answers that are different from those that have been accepted as truth without questioning. Most, however, are so dissociated from their condition that they will continue to follow their "faith-based marching orders" and will question nothing. So it is. Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
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